ACE sees export boom after CI drive

The firm has secured three big projects in aerospace, communications and the medical sector, taking overseas trade to 38% of its £5 million turnover. It comes after the company embarked on a continuous improvement drive that has increased on time delivery and right first time performance.

Explains managing director Ian Whateley: “Our export activity has been steadily growing year-on-year since 2010, but the last seven months have definitely seen a spike that we’re hoping to sustain.

“There may be an element of the pound slipping making us more competitive. However, a lot of the projects we are winning are extremely technical and not many firms around the world can deliver the complexity of components the customer requires.”

He continues: “Interest has come from all over too…Germany, Luxembourg, United States of America, we’ve even had orders from customers in Australia, New Zealand, South Korea and Thailand.”

The latest continuous improvement exercise has been in operation for six months and has involved collecting data on current operating parameters and reviewing what is working well and what could be improved.

This has seen the firm alter its chemistry settings and the introduction of twice daily process control checks, which have already resulted in a 2% increase on right first time figures and the potential for a 10% boost in throughput on certain products.

Whateley adds: “We are really pleased with the results of this latest exercise and we now have daily improvement meetings to ensure all work instructions and operating procedures are being reviewed. It has also allowed us to create a robust new product introduction system with technically challenging jobs and new processes for exotic materials never before etched.”